Happy May Day !

May 1, 2015 by Gia Lau 4 Comments

Gia here to say welcome to the monthly kickoff post and welcome to new friends and subscribers this month!  We have so much going on this month, so I am going to cut right to the chase and try to cover everything.

First, we welcome Kate Kennedy, our May Student of the Month to the Clique this month. She has already made an amazing unboxing video of the May kit and if you have not seen it, its a great way to pass the time while waiting for yours to arrive! The May kit Carnival is a favorite for Amy Tangerine lovers because it features her newest collection Rise & Shine with a twist! We decided to emphasize the kraft elements in the collection, and add some really fun new Happy Hues paint from Jillibean soup in the perfect shade of yummy yellow. We think you are going to have a blast working with all of the exclusive pieces in the kit also, and I have to say that my personal fave, which was also “liked” by Amy Tan herself (fo’ real!) are the exclusive cards designed by our graphic designer Lacey Gasper.

Before I forget, Clique Kits wishes to express heartfelt empathy for the Earthquake victims in Nepal. It is really difficult for us to  fathom the magnitude of a tragedy like this. Clique Kits is keeping one of our own Varsity Team members in our thoughts and prayers as she waits on standby to possibly be sent in as part of a medical relief team. So, until conditions improve, and if Cassandra C. is sent to Nepal, until she returns safely, we will keep a CK love for Nepal heart in our sidebar! It looks like this:

Here are some sneaks of some of the inspiration you will see from the Varsity Team this month!

The next big event on the CK calendar besides the May kit is National Scrapbooking Day this weekend! We are celebrating Sunday, May 3rd with an interactive all day Facebook group event. Yes there was a fabulous special limited edition kit designed just for NSD and it is sold out…if you got one, LUCKY YOU, and if you didn’t- NO WORRIES AMIGA you can still join the party and it will be just as much fun! Use your stash, use a kit, use whatever you would like! The important thing is that you celebrate the passion you have for memory keeping, creating, feeding your soul, supporting others who are just like you, and sharing with a community. There will be many events going on- ours is just one of many- if we could all reach out and hold hands it would be like the biggest Kumbayah circle the world has ever seen. There will be free digitals I am told and there will also be a huge digital sale going on in the store! We will have challenges with different topics each hour as well as inspiring samples and giveaways hosted by a new designer, and subscribers, guests, and friends will be interacting between 11 and about 8 pm Central Daylight Time. Please check your time zone. I am terrible at math- thats what google is for. Okay- see you there ! 

Mother’s Day will be here before you know it. Nothing makes Mom smile like a handmade card! I am not actually a card maker but the one exception I usually make is to make cards for my Mom every year and for my scrappy friends who are Moms. Why? Because I know that they will actually understand what it means to be a Mom,  and try to fit in the thought, time, and energy it takes to put a handmade card together. Yep…they get it.They feel the love- even though nowadays I tend to make very simple cards- they can come together fast and still be beautiful and elegant! Have you seen these? Tasnim Ahmed was our Designer in the Spotlight last month and used our Card Kit, which by the way is still available I think (maybe? a few?) and she really makes gorgeous cards which I am extremely jealous of.

And now, I will wrap up this kick off post by giving you my HOT list of top 5 things to be in the KNOW about this month:

1. Pineapples are HOT and along with other slices of fruit (oranges, lemons, watermelons- this summer will be the FRUITIEST summer you have ever seen in a while. Look at this adorable cooler bag I just picked up from band-do. Remember, you heard it here first. We have lots more fruit coming in this summer …spoiler alert.

2. We are oh-so-patiently (NOT) waiting for our Hero Arts Ombre Inks to come in. We think they are going to be HOT this summer too! The promise date keeps getting pushed back by the manufacturer. But sometime this month (please!) Subbies- we’ll tell you as soon as know!

3. Dies and Die Cutting Files are not going out of style. Echo Park just released about a million new dies. There are zillions of new dies being produced, and people love cut files- many wonder if they need both. The answer is YES! They are different. For starters, dies have a finished edge, and cut files don’t. You can’t adjust the size of a manual die, but you can a digital file. So compare and contrast. I personally LOVE the quality of the Kesi-Art brand Clique Kits carries (mostly) which is WHY we carry them. If you use them once, you will see what I mean. There must be something about French metal. Oui.

4. The challenge will be posted next Saturday. Challenges are open to the public, which means you can tell all your friends, whether they subscribe or not they can link up whether they have a kit or not- and can win a prize from our sponsor! Anything goes is HOT! Yeah, we love it when people subscribe to our kits- the more subscribers we have, the more stuff we can offer for less dough. But we are mostly interested in being a community and growing our circle of friends- thats why we call it the Clique. So you do not have to pay to play friends. I think thats pretty HOT.

5. The I AM Workshop begins May 31st. That’s technically still May , so its counts. A lot of people have been wondering what the workshop is all about, and the simple answer is… it’s about YOU. It’s about autobiographical photography and memory keeping. Yeah that- the stuff we normally don’t do enough of. There will be new ‘lessons’ presented every week from May 31-July 19th, and participants will receive them via email and have access online as well in video and pdf format. The complete syllabus will be posted soon, so stay tuned. The kits are sold out, but the workshop will be offered for a mere $10. It will post along with the syllabus very soon!

Have a wonderful day and see y’all this weekend on Facebook!